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Monday, July 19, 2010

So I finally finished my car mats! My 5-year-old had many opinions about what I should make . . . so I used a lot of his ideas. He insisted on having a red house. (I really wanted a purple house a la Mr. Pine's Purple House . . . but I knew that eventually neither boy would want to play with the mat that had a purple house. Oh well.)

Originally I had planned to make the mats two-sided. But then I got to

thinking . . . after our trip is over my boys are still going to play with these (hopefully!) So, I made each one separate so that they can piece them together and make one big town.

clockwise from the top: playground, house, Target (our favorite), church

39 comments:

Very fun! My sister and I when we were little used to draw our own 'town' like this on big sheets of paper and tape it all together. I had not thought of using felt. My two would love this, might just have to make them one for Christmas-

great idea! i love how you included Target!i have 3 boys also. we live where it's very hot and need lots of "inside" ideas.check out my blog:www.allboystuff.blogspot.comyou may find some ideas that you like.

Thank you for this! I made one for a Christmas present this week and while it was easy and fun...it took a little time between tracing, cutting, ironing, cutting, ironing etc. My boys were fascinated by the whole process and I began to feel guilty that I wasn't making it for them. I didn't want to make another one out of felt but thought about what else I could do. We had a bunch of empty cereal boxes and decided to use those to create our own car mats. I used acrylic black craft paint and painted the roads on my cardboard mats. Then we went to town with just colored paper, stickers and glue. My kids had so much fun helping with the process and making their own houses, stores, zoo animals, etc. I was a much calmer and happier mom since I wasn't worried about them cutting or messing up my "perfect" felt shapes. Thanks so much for the great ideas. I've already made multiple Christmas presents from your site. ...the bath foam dolls are a big hit too!

I just made one of these for our upcoming flights for my 1 1/2 & 3 1/2 year olds. They really want to play with them now, but I have to keep them put away so they're new and interesting. And we had to include Target as well. I also made the dinosaur mat. I'm going to make the felt tool box too, but I cheated and bought little mini tools from the dollar spot at Target. I actually have daughters but they love all these things too.

I love this idea. My three old came to see what I was looking at and said mom I need those. But my question is how do I get your template for them? I couldnt see it anywhere. If you could please email me or tell me where I can find it.greenekh@gmail.com

Heather, the only templates I have are at the bottom of the post. You just have to click on it and print it. They aren't anything fancy... I just freehanded everything and then traced them onto the page for future use.

Right under the last picture of all four mats put together there are two pages of my sketches. Like I said, nothing fancy! If you are still having trouble let me know and I'll try to figure out why you can't see them.

Jeanine: I am so sorry. I see where you are talking about but I cant click on any of them to get the templates. I am sorry for bothering you with this. I normally can find it but like I said there is nothing to click on. Thank you so so much for helping me.

Elesa, I cut out an entire window of white and one out of pink camo felt. Then I cut them in thirds length-wise and alternated between pink camo and white when I stuck them on the mat. Does that make sense?